Chapter 21 #2
It was perhaps for the best that the Haverstock’s eldest son claimed the last dance before supper from Elizabeth almost as soon as he saw her.
If he had not, Darcy could scarcely have resisted the temptation to do so himself.
As it was, she was seated halfway down the table from him, where her conversation was inaudible, but her lovely, sparkling laughter sometimes reached his ears.
Georgiana, who had Mrs Annesley on one side and Mary Bennet on the other, was speaking as easily as though she had never thought of being shy.
As Darcy looked down the table of his family, friends, and neighbours, he felt an almost painful gratitude.
In all the world, there was only one thing he could think of to want.
After supper, Darcy made his civilities to his guests as quickly as he could and went to find his sister.
Though she had chosen not to dance, the evening would still present a particular challenge for Georgiana.
She and Miss Mary had decided that they would play their four-handed piece for the guests, despite all the challenges of playing so ambitious a piece before a large audience.
To judge by the many hours of practice Darcy had heard over the past days, nerves might present an obstacle to her performance, but lack of preparation certainly could not.
“Well, Georgiana,” he began. “I believe we shall have some singing and playing shortly. Are you ready?”
Rather to his surprise, Georgiana did not look daunted. “I am a little frightened,” she admitted, “but yes, I am ready.”
“I am glad to hear it,” Darcy said. “It is delightful to see your spirits so steady in anticipation of the performance. I confess I had rather wondered if I might need to reassure you that you are perfectly equal to it.”
Georgiana smiled at that. “You might have,” she said, “but Elizabeth spoke to me earlier.”
“And she told you that you need not be frightened?” Darcy said.
She shook her head. “Quite the opposite. She said it was all right to be frightened, but she hoped I would find my strength and perform anyway. And somehow, that made me feel equal to it.”
Almost at that moment, Elizabeth hurried up to them with Miss Mary in tow. For a moment, Darcy struggled to control his expression, for Mary Bennet, who had seemed so eager for chances to display, did look badly frightened.
“Mary is ready for your piece now,” Elizabeth said bracingly, giving her sister a reassuring squeeze about the shoulders. “I believe it is almost time.”
“Perhaps I should not,” Mary said hesitantly. “I might make a mistaken and ruin everything. There are so very many people, and everything is so fine —”
“Dear friend, we can do it together,” Georgiana said at once. “I can be brave if you can. I think we can manage, do not you?”
“Yes,” Mary said a little waveringly, and then more strongly. “Yes, we shall do it together.”
After first encouraging the Ashton girls to perform, their turn had come.
Darcy watched his sister carefully for signs of re-emerging nervousness and was pleased to find none.
Georgiana sat beside Mary on the bench and looked, for the first time in much too long, like a young woman who was simply happy to be where she was.
Their piece was a notable success, and the applause they received confirmed it. Miss Mary looked faintly astonished by the enthusiasm of the response, while Georgiana looked delighted by it. They rose together from the instrument, laughing over some mistake only they appeared to remember.
Several guests crossed the room to compliment them, and Mis Mary, who generally accepted praise with the solemnity of a bishop receiving tribute, seemed entirely unsure what to do with so much of it. Georgiana rescued her by answering half the compliments herself.
When the attention of the room had shifted to the next to perform, Darcy found his way to her and spoke quietly under the music. “Wonderfully well done, Georgiana. I am proud of you. Both for the music and for your courage.”
“Oh, Brother,” she said, “that means a great deal to me.”
He smiled. “It is no more than you deserve. You are growing up to be a most elegant and accomplished young lady, Georgie.”
Georgiana blushed a little at his praise. “Fitzwilliam,” she said, taking his arm. “I want to thank you.”
“For the ball?”
“For inviting them.” She looked across the room to where Elizabeth was talking with the Lonsdale daughters and laughing at something one of them had said. “I have not enjoyed myself so much in all my life. I mean that. Not in all my life.”
He looked at his sister. The careful stillness she had worn for long months was gone this evening, not forced away but simply absent, and what was in its place was the Georgiana he remembered from before Ramsgate, open and easy and entirely present.
He had not been certain he would see her like this again.
“I am very glad,” he said.
“It is such fun to talk with Mary, for she is as much interested in music as I am. And Elizabeth —” Georgiana smiled. “She is so good. She is kind to everyone, and she never makes anyone feel small, and she is funny without being unkind about it, which is rarer than it should be.”
“So it is,” Darcy agreed. “And yes. Indeed, she is.”
Georgiana paused for a moment before she spoke. “It would be delightful if Elizabeth were my sister. Do not you think?”
“Georgiana.”
“Do not claim you are indifferent.”
“I will not,” Darcy said quietly. “But it is not simple, Georgiana. You would not have me force my feelings on her when she is my guest. Do you not see? Her home is not a comfortable place. Pemberley cannot be anything less than a sanctuary for her. I would not indulge my own feelings at such a cost.”
“I do not think such feelings would be unwelcome,” Georgiana said softly.
“I hope with all my heart that they would not be,” Darcy told her. “But my hopes cannot be more important than her comfort.”
“Oh, Fitzwilliam,” Georgiana said. She touched his shoulder gently, giving him a look that seemed oddly wise, and then, as though she knew there was nothing more to be said, she drifted away to speak again with Mary Bennet.
Darcy remained where he was for a moment and looked across the room at Elizabeth, who was now talking with old Colonel Ashton and appeared to be getting on very well with him, which was impressive because Colonel Ashton was not an easy man and had been difficult since the death of his wife three years ago.
She had him smiling. It had taken her perhaps four minutes.
He was in love with her. He had been in love with her for months, unshakably and with a force that made him half wonder if his heartbeat was driven by his love for her.
If anything, the summer at Pemberley had made everything more immediate and more impossible to reason away.
He knew her better now than he had in Kent.
He knew how she thought and what she cared about, and what made her laugh.
He knew that she was braver than she let most people see and kinder than she admitted, and that underneath the ease and the humour was a steadiness that had carried her family through eight months of difficulty without complaint.
Waiting to tell her that he loved her, not knowing when that day might come, felt increasingly like a weight equal to anything carried by Atlas.
The evening wound on. He danced again, twice, with the neighbours he was obliged to dance with, and he managed his guests and spoke to everyone he should, and all the while the less manageable part of his attention was where it had been all evening.
Near the end of the night, when the candles had burned low and many of the carriages had already gone, he found himself near the terrace doors with a glass he had not finished and the warm night air drifting in from outside.
Elizabeth stood a little way off, talking with Georgiana.
Both of them were easy, laughing over something he could not hear, and the sight of them together nearly undid him.
Their happiness, their comfort with one another, the simple rightness of Elizabeth standing there in his house beside his sister — it was very nearly more than he could arrange his expression around.
If he truly loved her, he would carry the burden himself. Darcy only hoped that knowledge would give him the strength to actually do it.